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Home > Workshops and Classes > Teacher Training > Beginnings > Online Beginnings > Table of Contents > Building a Relationship > Learning Students' Names

Learning Students' Names

Adapted from a Great Beginnings: Learning Students' Names
Center for Teaching Excellence, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas

Use a seating chart and have students sit in the same seats for the first few weeks until we are able to match names with faces. They usually choose the same seats anyway. You can explain that you are making a sincere attempt to learn as many names as possible and ask for their help.

Have students give their name each time before they speak. As you respond to the student's contribution, try using his/her name. "I like the example you used, Tania."

Use students' names as often as possible. Greet students by name when they come into class, make a short comment using student names as you pass back homework ("You did a nice job on this, Mark."), call on students by name and acknowledge comments with names.

For those of you who are adventuresome and visual: Have pairs of students interview one another and then introduce each other by creating a symbol which embodies that person's essence.

Students interview each other using questions such as unique traits, unusual hobbies, proudest moment, most prized possession, most unusual accomplishment, etc. Students then introduce their partner to the class.

Make up a sheet of fairly off-the-wall traits with blanks lines beside them. Such as "Is wearing shoes that don't require laces," "Likes spaghetti with clam sauce," or "Was born west of the Mississippi." This sheet is handed to every student. Students are asked to wander around the room, find a person with that trait, meet them and record their name. The one rule is that a student can use a person only once to complete his/her sheet.

Put students in groups of four. Then challenge the group to come up with five things they all have in common. Five is a nice odd number that will require some discussion to achieve (if you require four things in common, each member may just choose one and present it on behalf of the group). The one restriction is that the students can't use school- or work-related items. Personal items such as favorite music, books they've read, where they've traveled to, etc. work best.

Ask students to get into groups of 2 or more. Each student must find something in his/her wallet that would help the group understand who they are. Although pictures are a satisfactory option, encourage the students to search for the most creative things they can find.

Have a short quiz at the beginning of class over students' names. Make this fun. Challenge someone to name as many people as they can in the class or ask if anyone can name everyone in their row. Put students in teams and give them three minutes to collectively come up with as many names of fellow students as possible.

Have students make tent name tags (fold a 5 X 8 notecard in half) on the first day of class. Have students keep the name tags with them and place the tag in front of their seat during class.

Have instructors collect name tags at the end of the class. Instructors hand out name tags at the beginning of the next few classes. As name tags are handed out, the instructors try to match the name with the student, and then check to see if their guess is correct.

Have students wear name tags for the first two weeks of class.

Spend some time during the first day of class taking snapshots of all of your students. Use a polaroid or check out the digital camera from the Media Services (346-3091). Some teachers have their students zerox their driver's license or student body card.

Have students prepare a "Passport" for your class. Students glue a snapshot on a notecard for the instructor. Besides their snapshot ask students to write a variety of information to help the instructor get to know the student--likes and dislikes, background, and goals are especially helpful memory hints.

Strive to memorize a row of students per day. In the few minutes before class begins, review what you've already memorized and then add another row of students to that list.

Students with the same name as another person the instructor knows can be associated with that person in the instructor's memory. This association is a good memory-jogging tool.

Have a few students introduce themselves. Then stop the introductions and ask another student to name all the students who have been introduced. Once the first few names have been recalled move on to a few more, and so on until everyone has been introduced.

On a notecard students write the name they prefer to be called in class. Below their name they are asked to write thing which will make them memorable--favorite movie or music group, favorite quote or place they'd most like to visit.

Have students pair up and introduce themselves. After a fair amount of time, the partners are asked to introduce each other to the class. Special points to address in the interview could be: the partner's name, major, background, future goals, etc.

Large Classes

A tip for large classes: dividing the entire group into smaller "working groups" will help facilitate name recall. Classroom time can be used to give small projects for each group to work on. Only having to remember 8-9 people in a small group is much easier than looking at 250 faces. Work on visualizing which faces sit in which seats. Then work on memorizing every name from a particular group.

All 250 names may not be memorized during the semester, but this method may help you to learn more than you normally would.

On the other side of the argument, some instructors believe personalizing the atmosphere by learning everyone's name is not required for a positive classroom climate.

In large lecture classes, where students may feel overwhelmed by speaking in front of the huge number of people in the room, anonymity may help. The instructor may tell the students from the beginning, "I don't know any of your names, and I couldn't possibly learn them. So I don't want anyone to feel any inhibition about asking a question." This helps to assure students that their remarks will not be permanently held above their heads because others don't know who they are.

 

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